Whose Tapestry Is It Anyway?
Andrew Bridgeford argues that we have failed to appreciate the ingenuity and complexity of the story depicted by the Bayeux Tapestry.
The Bayeux Tapestry is at once one of the most extraordinary historical records and captivating works of art of the Middle Ages. But have we all been misreading it for centuries? I believe it contains hitherto unsuspected layers of meaning and can shed new light on the last days of Anglo-Saxon England. The Tapestry is in truth a dangerous, many-layered masterpiece, and, far from telling the story ‘strictly from the Norman point of view’, it subtly undermines Norman propaganda at almost every turn.
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